So my mother finally has a decent laptop, but there is one thing that bugs me.

Laptop in question: Acer Aspire V5-552-0578G1Taii

The processor is said and advertised to be 2.5 GHz and turbo to 3.5GHz.

The thing is, it never actually go to even 2.5 GHz when gaming, it down clocks to 1.6Ghz or so~

This way, games really run like crap because the processor doesn't go up like it should.

And when it is doing Facebook and stuff it goes to 3.2GHz :S

When i disable a core (through msconfig) it stays at a good 2.5 GHz, like it should, but then it isn't a quad-core and the power saving options are disabled...

The temps are fine and it maxes out at 71c and the APU videocard is even less than that and maxes out at 58c.

Maybe it is worth mentioning this is done on Windows 8.1 and for some stupid reason the drive is GPT so i can't install a new windows 7 on it unless i delete the old one and completely format the drive >.>

Any idea how this can be fixed? I would gladly disable all this "power saving" crap and just let it run on 2,5ghz as a quadcore, period, but of course i don't have any access to that in the bios being a laptop and all.

A third party program would be really helpful if it can do what i want. Radeon pro doesn't work, i already tried that, so anything other than that would be great.

You can get the weeny out of the war, but you cannot get the war out of the weeny

I looked at your post because I have a similar laptop as the one mentioned, I have the V552G, where I have the A8-5557M and a HD 8750M working in dual graphics.

Two things that I would suggest beginning with : how do the power options in the control panel are set? I just noticed myself that mine was reversed and set actually slower while on grid than on battery, thanks to your post.

The other thing : Do you still have McAfee installed (which comes by default with my laptop, hence the question)? While there is no apparent settings, some security suite might prevent full CPU usage for some applications, thinking that it is a power virus.

I proceeded with a quad core bench (Here is the original site) and rthdribl GPU bench. I saw that frequency was steady at 115% with Win 8 resource monitor, once I have put the proper settings in power options. If I used the bench only, I would get up to 133% speed. The application actually measured 2096 MHz, which is default clock for my 5557M.

Take a look into the advanced options of the power plan, set both (grid and battery) on 50% minimum performance and 100% maximum performance. When it is set lower than 100%, it will never boost.

Which temperature monitoring program did you use? When I use HWMonitor, I have a probe (package temperature under CPU) that reports in between 75 and 104°C. But under Acer Dazzle, I have around the same temp as the GPU (which would make sense for an APU) between 35 and 55.

I am quite stumped that your reported temperatures are fine and the clocks still being down.

1 Take a look into the advanced options of the power plan, set both (grid and battery) on 50% minimum performance and 100% maximum performance. When it is set lower than 100%, it will never boost.

2 Which temperature monitoring program did you use? When I use HWMonitor, I have a probe (package temperature under CPU) that reports in between 75 and 104°C. But under Acer Dazzle, I have around the same temp as the GPU (which would make sense for an APU) between 35 and 55.

3 I am quite stumped that your reported temperatures are fine and the clocks still being down.

1 Already have everything @100%.

2 hwmonitor. it is the only one that is compatible lol.

3 So am i...

You can get the weeny out of the war, but you cannot get the war out of the weeny

My problem with flashing a brand new computer is that it shouldn't be. If the flash fails and you get stuck with a brick, you will be raging, at least I know I would.

There is no chipset driver available so that is crossed out as well.

I highly doubt it is the bios, as i have already checked that and no options were there to alter any setting except boot device priority and changing the bios to legacy (which i need if i want to install any new windows on it).

Not going to risk it either as it isn't that big of an issue for my mom since she is not that into pc gaming (except puzzle games and the like).

I thought it was strange the processor isn't behaving like it should be, hence starting this topic

You can get the weeny out of the war, but you cannot get the war out of the weeny

Well then, she just might enjoy longer battery life ! I was able to use Excel for 7 hours without plugging the PC, I was quite impressed!

I had the idea that the couple MHz might not trouble your mom too much. I have seen one or two women (that were in the same age range of my mom) that were looking forward to upgrade for newer games, in all my life.

My mom runs a core 2 duo on a early gen of Intel 775 board. The CPU isn't officially supported, so the result being that the CPU runs at half speed. It happened to me as well with a similar proc and a different board and I can confirm that the board was too old. She doesn't even mind, WIn 7 is speedy enough for her taste. Jewel Quest doesn't ask that much power.